Still, Macy's tried to blame much of its disappointing results on China, though indirectly. Second-quarter results were expected to be poor, but they were even worse than expected. Comparable-store sales were down 1.5 percent.

CEO Terry Lundgren said "the strong U.S. dollar has led to significantly lower international tourist spending."

That's right. Even with 100 percent of the sales in the U.S., the retailer got hit because the Chinese and Brazilians weren't coming to New York to shop.

Seriously. Macy's blames it on Chinese and Brazilian tourists, and the port strike, and weak spending in apparel in general.

Macy's held full-year guidance flat at $4.70 to $4.80 a share. Consensus is $4.63 a share, though there is a gain on the sale of a Brooklyn store. Excluding that sale, guidance is lower, some estimate by $0.45 a share.

Reports that Apple Watch sales have been below expectations may be true, but even with lower-than-expected sales it appears to be enough to be disrupting the "traditional" watch market, at least for Fossil.

Fossil (constant dollars):

Watches: flat

Leathers: up 9 percent

Jewelry: up 11 percent

An equal problem has been the strong dollar, the bane of multinational companies this reporting season. Second quarter revenues for Fossil were down 4 percent, but taking out the effect of the strong dollar revenues were actually up 2 percent.

Think about that. A six percentage point swing on revenues, just on currency. That is huge.

Given shifting tastes in consumer demand, uncertain growth in Europe and China, and the strength of the dollar, it's little wonder that forecasting earnings for global retailers has become a very difficult proposition.